Bear Stalking: It’s not fear, it’s excitement

September 18, 2001 — “I just can’t believe that anybody would do that to anybody,” Jim Collins said to me, staring at the road in pained puzzlement. “I don’t care who they are. That’s just beyond my comprehension.”

The same conversation, I’m sure, was likely going on in pickup trucks across the country last Thursday. America was only two days removed from terror; what was once unthinkable was now all there was to think about.

And I was sick of it. I was sick of the images I saw over and over again on CNN. I was sick of wondering whether all of my friends were still alive.

I was quite thankful, then, to see Jim Collins’ truck pull up in front of my house on Thursday. He was there to take me away from it all — to a place where my cell phone didn’t receive a signal, a place without televisions or terrorists.

Of course, the place we were headed is known to have its share of wild bears. And it was our intention to find them.

This was new for me. I have spent much of my life trying to avoid contact with such creatures. And, so far, I have been rather successful.

Now I was planning on sneaking up on them?

I don’t normally dress in full fatigues, so the answer was yes. This is Collins’ hobby. He finds wild bears. He videotapes them. Then he goes home — which, to me, is the most important aspect of the adventure.

When Collins and I arrived at our White County stalking grounds — the exact location of which Collins requested that I not reveal — he showed me where he hides the keys to his truck.

“In case I get ate,” Collins said with a half-smile. I considered swiping the keys, and the truck, right then.

In his 10 years tracking bears in the wild, Collins admits he has had a habit of getting “too close.” Collins also claims, however, he has never had a “close call.”

Although, his definition of “close call” differs greatly from mine.

Collins has been face-to-face with bears. He’s been encircled by them. He’s been snorted and snarled at, too.

“That’s not a close call?” I asked. “What are you thinking at moments like that?”

“I’m thinking I hope to hell that when he goes, he goes the other way,” Collins, 39, said.

“You’re not scared that he won’t go the other way?”

“There’s always a sense of fear. But it’s more excitement: just being that close to something that you know, if he wanted to, could tear you up.”

Collins would rather that didn’t happen to him. So he tries to be careful.

“Bears can’t see good at all,” Collins said.

But their noses work nicely. So Collins likes to enter the woods “clean” — virtually no trace of human scent on him — and camouflaged.

If the bear doesn’t know he’s there, there’s no reason to be scared. Collins usually goes unnoticed, even though he’s just a few feet away.

This whole hobby started by accident. Collins was walking through the woods scouting for deer with his camcorder. He saw a bear in the distance. He decided to record it.

Soon, the bear was no longer in the distance — it was only 15 feet away. Collins realized this when he lowered the camera from his face. The lens, he learned, has a tendency to make things — like bears, for example — appear farther away than they actually are. Collins would have liked to have learned this under safer circumstances.

“The picture got somewhat shaky after that,” Collins said.

But Collins kept recording — on that day, and the others that would follow. For the past 10 years, Collins and his camera have focused in on several hundred black bears in the mountains of North Georgia. He has 15 tapes, brimming with bear.

“You find them out there in their home territory, and they are so at ease,” Collins said. “It’s not like a deer or a turkey. They are just so calm once you get back in the woods a ways. It’s just like being in their living room.”

Speaking of living rooms, Collins has a bear — a big one — in his. He killed a 400-pound monster with his compound bow in 1997. At the time, it was the second-largest bear ever killed in Georgia. He ate the meat — “delicious,” he said — and had the bear stuffed.

“I’ve got my house decorated around that bear,” admitted Collins, who, it should be noted here, lives alone.

The 400-pounder was Collins’ trophy, the kill of a lifetime. He hasn’t shot at a bear since.

“Right now,” Collins said, “I like hunting with my camera. I really don’t care about killing another one.”

We walked through the woods for hours. Collins slung his camcorder — which, like us, was fully camouflaged — over his shoulder and led the way.

Collins calls this “creeping,” not hiking. We tiptoed between the trees, stepping on rocks instead of leaves whenever possible.

Collins, with his compass, kept track of the wind, as well. If it’s blowing at your back, it’s time for you to move. And if you’re smelling too much like a human, it’s time to spray a little “human scent neutralizer” on your clothes.

Collins was constantly looking for signs of bear. He scoured the ground for tracks and droppings. We’d stop and sit a while near their favorite feeding areas: white oaks, and fields of millet, sorghum, clover and pokeweed. Collins has been known to taste acorns himself, and target trees with the sweetest nuts.

“This place is full of good animals,” Collins said. He then added, “But there’s too many people tracks.”

Our talk eventually shifted to World Trade Centers and terrorists. It was obviously on our minds.

“You know, with all this going on, I feel kind of silly sitting here waiting for a bear,” Collins said.

We waited until dark. The bears never came. But I didn’t feel silly.

I’d rather look at an empty field in the forest than New York City on fire any day.